I’ve found myself in an interesting place tonight.

I guess it had been in the works for a few hours as the sun was going down…but I now find myself sitting outside once again listening to this orchestra of crickets sing away. As the months get colder, they will be gone. This familiar sound will be replaced by the stillness of cold air and here again, I will sit, only to hear leaves falling off of the trees and my own breathing.

The reason why I feel strange about this place I’ve landed tonight is because I’ve never actually been here before. In ways I have, but this…this is different to me. It’s all new. It’s all unknown. What I’ve been pondering throughout the day is purely about what I should do right now. As the day went on, the question was brought up in my mind. “What feels right to you?” and I quickly found my answer. I know what feels right to me. I know that what I am going to do may change somewhere down the line – I always leave myself open to that because I continuously run into unknowns and I don’t want to be stuck with one approach – but I really started to dig into what this path means to me…this journey…and why I am doing what I am doing.

It took me a long time to start making decisions based purely on internal factors inside of me that are telling me which direction to go. I’m not saying that external factors don’t play a part in all of this…but what I am saying is that when it comes down to it…I listen inwards. I listen to what that inner voice is telling me to do because I trust that voice. When I sit down to write, I hear that voice speaking – me and it are one of the same. But when I fall into questions…that voice is the deep low whisper that tells me that I am in good hands. That I don’t have to see the end result and that I can walk by faith. It’s almost like a “I got you, don’t you worry.”

That’s a really good feeling to have.

At times, it can be incredibly hard to trust in this voice. Honestly, it’s because that voice runs against the loud critic inside that is telling you to worry about each and every single thing that pops up. It tells you time and time again to run like hell or to panic…but the reality really is that there is nothing much to panic about. There’s just what’s here…what’s happening…what’s going on in this moment.

It’s a paralytic type of fear that keeps us from really seeing what’s going on in the moment. We speculate, wonder, bet on, worry…you get the point…on all of the things we cannot specifically see. We wonder what the path is before we have even paved the path that is right in front of us. It’s when we leave the safety of the known land for the unknown that we are truly alive. We’re really living. Sometimes there’s some anxiety that comes along with all of that but that’s nothing that some serious breathing cannot fix.

The question also comes into this heart and head of mine quite often…”If you make the decisions that you need to make because everything inside of you is pulling for you to do that…really what could you ever hang your head about?”

Really nothing.

There would be nothing to even think back on because I ran with what I knew was the right thing to do. Isn’t all of this really about building a unbreakable trust in ourselves that we are capable of committing to our dreams, loved ones, and what we want to bring into the world?

For me, when I think about all of this, I keep coming back to this idea of – what would I do. And really, sitting here tonight, what would I do with all of this? What would I do with where I am at if I had to make a decision? What feels right to me and why is that?

What feels right to me is to continue traveling down this road…the road not taken…and discover what is meant to happen here. What feels right to me is to let things pan out exactly the way they are supposed to. What feels right to me is to throw all of this stuff…everything external…up to the heavens and let them deal with it. Because honestly, I have no idea with some of these things. I don’t know. I’m not embarrassed to say that. But what I would be embarrassed about is pretending I had some clue or refusing to follow this inner voice. So until those answers fall back down from the sky…I’m continuing on doing what I trust in. Those decisions are made because I made them…not because of anything else…and that, I will take to the bank every time.

Evan Sanders
The Better Man Project